Hi Beefmaster,Beefmaster wrote:Hey Rudi, nice pics again! I assume you adjusted your temperature down to get the skies blue again?? What do you think made my photos so soft?? This is the first time I post on the web other than some mik and druks from long ago onto facebook. I shoot with a canon eos 450D with stock 70-300 lens, no ISM I'm afraid... The pics were nice and sharp until I posted themWhat you shoot with?? I've been looking around for a new lens of better quality, am considering the 50-500 or 120-400 sigma, priced well compared to Canon...
Thanks!
I shoot RAW so it is easy to adjust the color temp but in this case I did not do any adjustments. If your images are sharp before you downsize but not after it could be the way you downsize, I use a program called "BreezeBrowser", it works well and is fast, it can also do batches and produce HTML output for web page use. I do the RAW to JPG conversion with C1pro.
You should get good results with the 450D + 70-300. A L class lens with USM would be better giving you overall better results with more "keepers" but it is not a must. For airshows I normally use a 1DmkIV or 7D if I want to travel light for the flight shots along with a Canon 100-400 L IS. If I cannot get close to the flight line I sometimes use my Canon 600L f4 IS but it is bulky so I seldom do that. For static shots I normally use a 5Dmk2 or 1DSmk3 with the Canon 24-105 L IS lens.
The photos above where however taken with my "mik and druk" setup that I normally take with when I am flying into an airshow and I do not want to lug the normal stuff along. This is an old setup consisting of a Nikon D200 with a Nikon 18-200 VR lens. Not an ideal setup with a rather slow focusing and "soft", short lens on a body that is nowhere as good as the Canons BUT the light combo with only one lens works for me. I am thinking of replacing this with my 7D and a Canon 18-200 IS lens, I am sure it will give me better results as the 7D focus is superb and according to reviews the Canon 18-200 is the same or slightly better than the Nikon version.
The Sigma 50-500 is good, I used it for many years (airshows and motorsport) and I think the new OS version would be even better as a 500mm lens, hand-held without VR/IS/OS requires very good "long lens" techniques. I do not really know the Sigma 100-400. I also own the superb Sigma 120-300 f2.8 but find it a bit heavy for airshow work.
In the past I used a Nikon D3X with a 200-400 VR and it worked ok but I prefer the images the Canon sensors produce.
Hope to see you at an airshow/fly-in sometime!
Regards,
Rudi
Hey there Gav!! Anytime bud, juse a call away 
